Book review

The tragic story of Emmett Till still shocks the conscience of our nation. It was the summer of 1955. Fourteen years of age, Emmett was a good natured Black adolescent from Chicago. He traveled by train to visit family in rural Mississippi. It was his first time in the Deep South, a far cry from the northern city of his origin. His mother Mamie was nervous about her son’s journey. Just before departure Emmett gave her his watch. He doubted he would need it where he was headed. Emmett did keep the ring on his finger. It was his late father Louis Till’s ring.

Arts

Two Japanese-American men share the long-lasting effects of the U.S. concentration camps

The friendship between Lawrence Matsuda and Roger Shimomura began with an art sale. Both are Japanese-American, and Matsuda was among the first Japanese-Americans to purchase a piece of Shimomura’s art. Shimomura invited Matsuda to lunch, and they bonded over Bruce Lee stories, a love for salmon fishing and sharing the same middle name — Yutaka. They first met about 10 years ago.

It was only a matter of time before the poet and artist, both successful in their respective fields, collaborated on a project.

News

Twenty-two people with no known address died in Seattle and King County during the first two months of 2017, and a group of women dressed in black stood vigil on March 8 as a silent reminder that their deaths would not be forgotten.

Women in Black, a project of the Women’s Housing Equality and Enhancement League (WHEEL), conducts their remembrances using data they receive data from the King County Medical Examiner’s office documenting the number of deaths over the previous month.

Two bills that would extend fees that provide one of the largest sources of funding for homeless services and affordable housing are up for debate in Olympia, and it’s making officials in King County nervous.

Document recording fees are surcharges attached to some real estate transactions assessed by the county. The lion’s share of the existing fees is set to expire in 2019 unless the legislature intervenes to extend them.

A local news station put up and took down a crowd-sourced map of homeless encampments after community members took them to task on social media for endangering the lives of people living on the streets.

KIRO 7, a member of the Cox media group, asked its followers on March 9 to send in the locations of homeless encampments in order to map their location and prevalence in Seattle. The team claimed that the city of Seattle did not have such a map, and promised to share the locations of such encampments with the city “as we said we would do.”

Attendees of a private event celebrating Irish heritage featuring Mayor Ed Murray lifted and carried out a woman protesting a youth detention facility proposed by King County and approved by the city of Seattle.

E. Rose Harriot, an activist involved in the opposition to the youth jail, was taken out of a lunch held at FX McRory’s in Pioneer Square after she and four other protesters interrupted Murray while he read a proclamation about Irish heritage.

King County Prosecuting Attorney Dan Satterberg announced Tuesday that he would not file charges against two Seattle Police Department officers who shot and killed Che Taylor in February 2016.

The decision brought swift outcry from the Seattle King County branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), which said in a statement that it was disappointed, but not surprised.

Features

Jade Solomon Curtis moves across the stage with intention and purpose. Her entire body is permeated with the emotion she needs to convey. She easily convinces the audience by manipulating her limbs.

Curtis found her passion for dance while in middle school. The Lubbock, Texas, native received her bachelor of fine arts at Southern Methodist University in Dallas and is the subject of an Emmy award-winning film. She moved to Seattle several years ago to work with Donald Byrd of Spectrum Dance Theater.

Opinion

If suffering were an Olympic sport, Raven Canon would be a gold medalist. She was born in 1976 with her intestines outside her body, and came into this world facing surgeries, poverty, problems eating, and eventually, addiction and two decades of on and off homelessness.

She took all of that and turned it into her superpower. When I met Raven, she was still homeless, nearly a year sober and all about helping others.

To share space is to give of something we do not own, are not entitled to and which has been gifted to us. I did not learn this on my own, as on my own I am selfish and entitled, believing I own the space I inhabit. If, like the proverbial lesson in kindergarten, I have learned to share, it is because the people at the Aurora Commons have taught me how.

It was midwinter break and I had a week off from work as my students were on a well-needed break. I got my ticket and headed to the airport for some much-needed sun in L.A. As I arrived at the airport — maybe it was the activism I have done, maybe it was all the “woke” posts I see on Facebook — something I hadn’t noticed before became clear. As I walk to the terminal, there were signs at the express terminals that read “Elite” and “First Class.” I’ve never found myself in one of those lines or had whatever credentials needed to be accepted by the smiling strangers at the desk.

Our strange president says that — besides making our military more capable of disintegrating the world and eliminating pesky immigrants and putting sick people in their place (alleys and dumpsters) — he will fix America’s ailing infrastructure. So what is this infrastructure thing and how do you fix it?

The examples I keep hearing about are bridges and roads. Those sound infrastructurish, but are they the whole picture? To answer the question, “what is infrastructure?” I would ask “what is infra-?” and then “what is -structure?”

James Marshalek used to “fly a sign” asking for money, but he didn’t like asking for something for nothing.

“It’s not just about money, it’s about self-respect.”

“I told the good Lord I needed something else. I talked to a brother selling Real Change.” Then, he started selling it, too. Now, “people fly a sign next to me all the time and it really bothers me when they ask my customers for money.”